Hueck, Christoph J. (2026) Seeing the organism with ‘living’ concepts: Goethe, Steiner, and the epistemology of organic self-formation - preprint. [Preprint]
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PRODUCTIVE INTUITION OF AN ORGANISM’S VITAL FORCE IN GOETHE AND STEINER - final preprint version.pdf - Updated Version Download (823kB) |
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Abstract
The living organism raises a distinctive epistemological problem: biology presupposes wholeness, purposiveness, and self-generation, yet these cannot be derived from interactions among independently identifiable parts. I argue that the classic opposition between mechanism, vitalism, and organicism reflects different responses to this difficulty—how organisms become intelligible objects of knowledge. Building on Kant’s analysis of teleological judgment, I offer a systematic reading of Goethe’s morphology and Steiner’s interpretation of it. Goethe’s conception of plant metamorphosis is presented as a morphological construction: not the subsumption of data under fixed concepts, but the use of transformable “living concepts” that reconstruct a formative process, analogous to (yet distinct from) mathematical construction in physics. Steiner radicalizes this idea by claiming that productive reconstruction can disclose not only lawful organization but the organism’s self-generating activity. In dialogue with Fichte’s notion of intellectual intuition, I propose that reenacting organic formation in thought establishes a structural correspondence (not identity) between cognitive activity and organic self-formation. The result is neither ontological vitalism nor a merely methodological organicism. This epistemology complements, rather than replaces, causal-mechanistic analysis.
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| Item Type: | Preprint | ||||||
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| Keywords: | Organicism; Vitalism; Goethean Science; Urpflanze; Intuitive Understanding; Intellectual Intuition | ||||||
| Subjects: | General Issues > Reductionism/Holism | ||||||
| Depositing User: | Dr. Christoph J. Hueck | ||||||
| Date Deposited: | 23 Feb 2026 13:59 | ||||||
| Last Modified: | 23 Feb 2026 13:59 | ||||||
| Item ID: | 28315 | ||||||
| Subjects: | General Issues > Reductionism/Holism | ||||||
| Date: | 22 February 2026 | ||||||
| URI: | https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/id/eprint/28315 |
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Productive Intuition of an Organism's Vital Force in Goethe and Steiner - preprint. (deposited 11 Jul 2025 13:06)
- Seeing the organism with ‘living’ concepts: Goethe, Steiner, and the epistemology of organic self-formation - preprint. (deposited 23 Feb 2026 13:59) [Currently Displayed]
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